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“Just in my swim shorts, barefooted, wild-haired, in the red fire dark, singing, swigging wine, spitting, jumping, running — that’s the way to live. All alone and free in the soft sands of the beach by the sigh of the sea out there, with the Ma-Wink fallopian virgin warm stars reflecting on the outer channel fluid belly waters.”

The Dharma Bums is a novel about Japhy and Ray, a pair of Zen Lunatics with different approaches to their Buddhism. While Japhy is wild and joyful, springing from girls’ beds to mountaintops and planning to lose himself on a mystical mountain in Japan, Ray is a more serious character who struggles with his philosophies and his efforts toward detachment. Continue reading →

“What is that feeling when you’re driving away from people and they recede on the plain till you see their specks dispersing? – it’s the too-huge world vaulting us, and it’s good-bye. But we lean forward to the next crazy venture beneath the skies.”

I am pleased to announce that Diamond “Dee” of Dee’s Reads has won my giveaway, which was held to celebrate reaching 200 blog followers! From the list of books I have written about here on Books Speak Volumes, Dee has chosen to receive a copy of On the Road by Jack Kerouac. I have emailed her for her mailing address and will order her a copy from The Book Depository as soon as possible!

Thank you to everyone who participated, wished me congratulations, and said kind words about my blog. Your support means so much to me!

2012 is turning out to be a huge year for movie adaptations of amazing books! The first half of the year saw the release of the movie version of contemporary favorite The Hunger Games, and this fall and winter will see the release of film adaptations to seven really great books — although I must admit I have read only five of them. Read on for trailers, release dates, casting info, and my thoughts! Continue reading →

At 21 years old, I am incredibly lucky to have had a wide range of travel experiences. I’m from an adventurous family; I lived in Australia from ages two to five (military kid), road-tripped from Boston to Montana and Wyoming at nine, and spent two weeks riding an RV around Alaska at thirteen. I enjoyed these trips, but in a passive way. I wasn’t really involved in them; I was just along for the ride, following my parents. I discovered the thrill of traveling for myself my sophomore year of college, when I was able to study abroad in London.

As much as I loved living in this huge, amazing city, my favorite thing about the semester was the opportunity it afforded to travel and to explore Europe. During my four-month stay in the UK, I made trips to Scotland, Belgium, the Netherlands, Italy, and France, as well as shorter day-trips within England. I discovered that I really love to travel. To land in a foreign place and spend days just walking and seeing things I couldn’t experience anywhere else.

Ever since I returned home over a year ago, I’ve had a major case of wanderlust. I’ll spend hours reading my Let’s Go: Europe guidebook, learning what there is to do in Prague or which cities I should visit in Sweden. I have itineraries written out for trips to Ireland, Portugal, and Croatia, and folders on my computer full of pictures of Norwegian fjords, Medieval French towns, Peruvian Inca ruins, and Cambodian temples. My soul is constantly yearning to be on the move again. But since I can’t be traveling all the time, I like to read books about other people’s adventures. Sure, these books can’t quite satiate my hunger for travel, but they can be informative and truly inspiring. For any other bookworms who are constantly hearing the call of the road (or train, or plane), I’d like to share some of my favorites: Continue reading →